


Episode VIII: Heir to the Sith

by softly_speaking_valkyrie



Series: Love Across the Stars [12]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon Rewrite, Canon-Typical Violence, Eventual Romance, F/F, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, Lots of Angst, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Plot, Plot Twists, Rewrite, Romance, The Last Jedi Rewrite, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-14
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:07:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24721312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softly_speaking_valkyrie/pseuds/softly_speaking_valkyrie
Summary: Complete rewrite of Star Wars: The Last Jedi | After the destruction of Starkiller Base, the First Order launches a full-scale war against both the Resistance and the remaining military forces of the New Republic. Meanwhile, General Leia Organa relocates her band of fighters to a secluded former Rebel stronghold on the salt world of Crait while Rey undergoes her Jedi training with a reluctant Master Luke Skywalker on the verdant world of Ach-To but is weary to rejoin the Resistance with the feeling of Kylo Ren still out there searching for her. As his patience grows thin, and Supreme Leader Snoke turns his attention to galactic conquest, Ren must utilise his testy relationship with General Armitage Hux to fulfil his goals, however, the Sith begins to grow suspicious of Captain Phasma after she has a secluded encounter with Rey on the world of Takodana shortly after the destruction of the First Order's superweapon. With the spies of the First Order searching for the Resistance everywhere, Poe Dameron, Finn, Kaydel Ko Connix and Rose Tico embark on missions to bolster the new rebel forces...
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Kylo Ren, Kaydel Ko Connix/Rose Tico, Phasma/Rey, Poe Dameron/Finn
Series: Love Across the Stars [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1756282
Comments: 1
Kudos: 11





	Episode VIII: Heir to the Sith

**Author's Note:**

> Two years after the events of Star Wars: The Force Awakens...

_A new war has begun! The destruction of the dreaded Starkiller Base has sparked a new Galactic Civil War, thrusting the courageous RESISTANCE into a bitter and lob-sided conflict with the vastly more powerful FIRST ORDER for the liberty and fate of the whole galaxy._

_GENERAL LEIA ORGANA has led her band of freedom fighters from their former base on D’QAR and has set up a new base of operations on the former Rebellion stronghold world of CRAIT. The First Order is hot on their trail, defeating the Resistance in almost every engagement following the destruction of Starkiller, and the whole time the menacing KYLO REN searches their ranks for the location of his former master, determined to find both Skywalker and his new apprentice, the scavenger REY._

_Meanwhile, SUPREME LEADER SNOKE culls his ranks of malcontent officers and scales back, removing General Hux as commander in chief and replacing him for his failure at Starkiller. CAPTAIN PHASMA and her allegiance also begin to shift as many of those within the First Order begin to suspect her actions on the superweapon. Now, Rey attempts to rejoin the Resistance after her training on ACH-TO, but both Snoke and Ren are ready to receive her and snuff out the dwindling Resistance as they release recon teams to find their hideout...._

* * *

Space lay still, as still as it could do. The _Resurgent_ -class Star Destroyer belonging to Lord Ren, Kylo Ren, the _Finalizer_ loomed over the shadow of a rogue moon, imposing and like death come to visit. From the bowels of its loading and launch bay, several craft began to launch – recon ships in the forms of standard First Order drop ships like those used on Jakku and Takodana. They launched all as one conglomeration of formation vessels, then all began to split off in different directions. Starfighters flew in tangent with them and then began to coalesce into formations of their own, away from the main groups. Drop ships moved like jagged pieces of undiscerning debris come to life, and one by one the smaller ships found their vectors and blasted into Hyperspace. The familiar sound was silenced by the vacuum, and from the bridge, Armitage could spot them all leaving underneath the bow and bilge of his Star Destroyer. His destroyer, not Ren’s.

“Well, sir; the ships have been deployed just as the Supreme Leader instructed,” Hux reported to the masked force-user standing attentive out at the centre of the observation panel of the bridge.

It had been designed to look and function to the near-exact specifications as an _Imperial II_ -class Star Destroyer of old. Nearly everything in the First Order borrowed from the Emperor’s design constructed by Sienar Fleet Systems. Snoke and Rae Sloane before had constructed the new Empire to invoke the same fear through their shapes and forms of ships as the old one, only this time things would be different – things were already different. It had been two years still, but Hosnian Prime was utterly decimated, the New Republic left reeling as they now watched the First Order invade from the Outer Rim and Unknown Regions. And yet Ren and Hux both stayed behind.

“I trust that your reconnaissance teams will not fail to locate the Resistance this time, General,” Kylo Ren sneered at his subordinate. Despite all the reshuffling, Snoke had performed within his military and his mighty navy, both Armitage and Ren had been stuck together for the better part of two years now; neither had developed anything but contempt for the other. Still, each found his companion useful in plenty of ways.

“Of course, Lord Ren,” Hux jeered, returning his glance out of the viewport at space as the rest of the deployment of drop ships continued to launch and find escape vectors into Hyperspace. “It is only a matter of time before we find them, the Supreme Leader has faith in our efforts; the Resistance cannot hide forever...”

“And what of your efforts to locate the scavenger and Skywalker?” Ren brought up again. This one desire, this obsession always not far from his mind when he was around Hux. “I trust the Supreme Leader should not be displeased with your attention to that problem, General.”

Hux let slip an eager and indulgent smile as he sidelined Ren with a shrewd as ever glance. The General kept everything close to the chest, especially from the upper echelons of the First Order command structure. No one could see the truth behind the redhead’s eyes, and what secrets he bore from everyone else – the only one who he seemed to truly trust made her way down the length of the bridge, navigating the bridge without looking down into the crew pits on either side. Again they were redesigns borrowed from the older models of destroyers, all the way back to layouts used in the Clone Wars. Captain Phasma was the only trooper to have her rifle in her hands, even on the bridge – she was the only one allowed. The chrome of her hull-plated battle armour shone in the lights of the monochrome and red decor of the bridge.

“General, all recon teams have departed,” Phasma reported, her voice clipped and as precise as Armitage’s – she had developed it and mimicked its style from listening to his father after all. The two exchanged a glance and the giantess nodded to him in knowing.

“You have still failed to answer my question, General Hux,” Ren demanded next to the General.

“Patience, Ren,” Hux shot back in retort, seemingly more confident with Phasma at his side. Over the past two years, it seemed the chrome-plated weapon of a woman had shifted in her loyalties. Where she used to report directly to and for Kylo Ren, now she almost solely kept her attention with Hux. She had not been the same since her encounter with the scavenger some months after the destruction of Starkiller.

“There has still been no new information on the girl since Phasma apprehended her on Takodana; we can only assume she fled and returned to Skywalker deep within the Core,” Hux continued.

“She certainly displayed as much of a desire, Sir,” Phasma spoke to Ren, the tone of her voice so obviously hiding something about that encounter. Even Ren had yet to see the report – Hux had effectively blocked his efforts time and again to read it, and Phasma was affectionately mum on almost all the details. They only came when Ren made an exception to ask such as this. “She was then, and remains now ever elusive.”

Ren had had enough already. “Perhaps if your soldiers were more effective, General, she would not have evaded our grasp,” he complained.

“ _Your_ grasp, Ren,” Hux silenced him, turning as Ren did. “Need I remind you that the Supreme Leader thinks that finding the Resistance base is of a higher concern than locating your precious scavenger and her master...”

He wanted to snap, to reach out with the Force channelling to his fingertips and to remind the still young general who was in command, who his superior was on his ship and in the First Order. But Hux’s cool smile and Phasma at his flank, and above all his usefulness forced Kylo Ren to refrain. He clenched his fists and bided his time and patience. “Yet, you fail to present the Supreme Leader neither,” he taunted the General. “I hope that this time, one team returns with a location to at least _one_ of Snoke’s targets... for your sake, General Hux.” He left swiftly afterwards, leaving Hux to turn to Phasma again.

The taller woman looked down a little, seeing the slender secrecy in her general’s glance at her. They shared this look a lot, both in front of and away from Ren. Something was brewing in the young Force-user, each could tell.

“The girl...”

“Yes,” Phasma addressed him, her visage completely blanketed by the inhuman mask of her chrome helmet – not once had Hux seen what she looked like underneath it. No one had seen underneath it. The last person to have looked at Phasma’s true face was Brendol Hux, whom both of them had killed long ago. “What of her?”

“On the planet...”

“Takodana, yes.”

“How _did_ she evade your capture?” Hux asked her again; it was not the first time the question had left his lips, but every time she had left him with a less and less convincing answer. “Tell me again, Phasma. Before Ren demands you tell him,” he ordered her, looking at her chest and staring at his youthful reflection glaring back at him within. “I want your story straight, and so do you.”

She stood stiffly, the rest of the bridge moving around them and minding their own business. Or so she hoped. They all knew their place regardless – the last officer to plot against her had been Cardinal, and just as she had seen to Hux’s father, she had disposed of her red counterpart just as easily and in record time. If anyone was eavesdropping, suspecting her of being less than forthcoming, she would find out and eliminate them just like all the rest. Phasma held herself assured in her armour; the only thought in the forefront of her tactile and calculating mind.

“I had the girl in my custody. She had done her best to disable the bomber but had been unsuccessful. A storm rolled in when night fell, during which she took her chance and managed to escape while I had my guard down. It was a moment of...”

“Weakness?” Hux asked as he had done before.

She stood still for a moment, considering her next response. “Yes... Not one I have managed to mistakenly demonstrate again since.”

Hux lingered his view upon her, looking her up and down and taking her words at face value again. This was the same story she’d given him every time he had asked her what had transpired on the moon of Takodana. He couldn’t see her eyes, no one could. Hux doubted whether or not he’d even find the true story or answer within them – Phasma had transformed mental fortitude into an art form since his father had brought her into his life that day on Parnassos. “Good.” He looked away from her, back out to space and gave a gesture to the ensigns standing in the navigational cluster within the crew pit. Stars turned to starlines and then the swirling blue vortex of Hyperspace within an instant. He left Phasma looking down at the floor, recalling her encounter with Rey. “When Ren comes to ask you soon, Phasma... Tell him exactly what you told me... And nothing else.”

“Yes, Sir,” Phasma spoke slowly, the harsh tone of her voice mellowing as she turned parallel to him.

“Keep the rest,” he told her without looking, knowing there would be more. “To yourself...”

That’s what she had done since it happened, since Rey had left her thereafter the storm had subsided. It had been fast and explicit on Takodana, and neither had had an encounter since; the possibility of there being another was slim to none, and yet Phasma had remained mum on the matter for almost two whole years. She had not betrayed Rey or what had happened between them on Takodana, not even to Hux. The scavenger wouldn’t know it, but their encounter had triggered something within Phasma that had been growing since they had met personally. Phasma didn’t know what it was, but it kept her mouth shut on the matter of Rey totally.

“Indeed, Sir.”

“You’re dismissed, Captain.”

“General,” an ensign approached the pair before Phasma had filed out of the general’s area. “Sir, Admiral Pryde requests you make contact with him,” the ensign reported.

Hux almost audibly sighed. “Very good, ensign. I’ll take it in my quarters. Carry on.”

The _Finalizer_ continued through the blue vortex that was Hyperspace outside of its bridge; Kylo Ren drowned the destroyer in his presence, a beacon of hate that stretched across the length and breadth of the galaxy. It could be felt all the way to the Core Words, the looming shadow of the First Order like a plague.

* * *

Rey woke from her meditation, the feeling of darkness encroaching in the back of her mind forcing her away from her connection to the Living Force. Luke stirred next to her, his eyes still shut as she looked out to the horizon – it had become most familiar to her over the past couple of years and now she knew it to be her home away from home (Jakku still lingered in the back of her mind even to this day, but the longer she spent with Luke, the more at ease about not being there she felt). As she felt the gentle breeze of the island brush across her face, sweeping back her now much shorter hair, she could feel her master beside her almost grumbling. Rey could not hope to focus now; her concentration had been completely shattered by the faint ring of negative intuition in the back of her mind. She could sense Ren out there, making moves against both her and her teacher, as well as her friends in the Resistance. She’d not seen them in almost two years – Chewie had taken the Falcon back to Leia, leaving Rey and Luke alone on the island with only Artoo.

“Control your emotions, Rey,” she could hear Master Skywalker in her ear, his eyes still shut and his voice a guiding light to her now flaring nerves.

She looked over to him, seeing his raise his father’s lightsaber with the precision of his mental fortitude and the Force so expertly controlled. He was as graceful as she had seen his sister be on D’Qar even when she was going through the hell of losing a loved one. And within Luke, Rey could always sense the lingering after-effect of what Kylo Ren had done to him – yet he maintained the stoic and aged grace that his sister had and what Rey wanted to accomplish.

“Feel the Force around you, Rey... Listen to what it has to tell you, no matter that may be,” Luke told her, easing her with his mental touch. To add to easing her racing mind he reached out for her shoulder and held her consolingly, sensing the thoughts rifling through her now eagerly waking mind. She had been attentive in meditation, and now Luke could see the apprehension in her form.

Rey felt the mechanical exterior of his cybernetic hand feel her padded shoulder. Suddenly the scene of how he had come to acquire it and how he had lost his original played in the theatre of her brain.

“Calm your mind...”

“Master, it’s a lot easier to do that when I can’t feel mechanically added prosthetic gripping me...”

Luke sighed, dismayed at her nonchalant shrugging of his touch. The lightsaber fell back into his lap and he grabbed it with his false appendage, handing it to her again – time and away they would have had more blades to teach her with, training lightsabers for Rey to use. But now all they had for her was the lightsaber of Luke’s father, given to him by Ben Kenobi.

“You’re losing focus, Rey... Again,” Luke told her with some scorned ire in his rugged and stony voice, standing up and moving back into the interior of the mountain. Like Rey’s, his hair was shorter too, much akin to how it used to be during his days in the Rebellion; his beard was clipped and had been constantly since she came to him but obscured still much of his olden face. Instead of the robes of a hermit, Master Skywalker kept himself clothed in the navy blue and black trappings of his old master’s attire, with a solemn and almost regal cape. He’d told her that Leia had fashioned the ensemble for him almost a lifetime ago when he was still a teacher at his Praxium. They were now the only remnants of that old life – every time he seemed glum, Rey could sense the traces of Kylo Ren within his robes.

“I’m sorry, Master Skywalker,” she excused herself, gripping his father’s saber tightly and slotting it into the cloth wrapping for it on her belt. Her white Jedi robes mirrored Luke’s oppositely and made them appear like the mural in the wading pool inside the mountain. “It’s Kylo Ren... He’s still out there scouring the galaxy for us and the Resistance.”

“Without Artoo or the map, neither he nor Snoke can find Ach To,” Luke told her. “I’ve told you before.”

“I’m not worried about the island, I’m concerned about him finding the Resistance...”

Luke sat on the edge of the ring into the wading pool and dipped his robotic hand into the stale and almost scummy water to observe the rippled it created. He maintained his cool demeanour despite the rattling unease in his apprentice’s body. “Have you seen him finding them? Can you feel through the Force that the First Order is close to finding them, Rey?”

She paused, consulting her inner third eye. She could see the Resistance stronghold, buried deep within a shrouded mountain veil in a salt mine with a set of flats leading up toward the bulkhead entrance. Inside were her friends, she had made sure to keep some of her mental faculty in watching over them from Ach To. So much of her sense was spent away from her body and Rey wondered if Luke was sparing some of his massing thoughts for General Organa. The past two years he had spoken and asked very little of Leia, or Chewie (the two had exchanged a lovely reunion when Rey had first landed on the island, but Luke had asked little since). It seemed his concerns were primarily left with Rey and training her, as well as consulting much with Artoo when the master and apprentice were not training together. When Rey had undertaken missions and trails away from the planet, such as her excursion around the space of Takodana where she had experienced an encounter with Phasma, she had not been permitted to take the blue and silver astromech unit with her. Nor had she yet explained to her master just what had happened on Takodana in Phasma’s custody.

Her mind lingered on too many thoughts, absent in a flow of concentration. It was as if with the shattering of the meditative mind had unleashed some inner fears or inner meltdown of her priorities. She could see the Resistance base, then Finn (basically her brother), then Takodana where Phasma and herself lay naked in the rain. Once again as she let her mind wander, she felt the pull from the sinkhole deep below the mountain.

“Rey?” Luke asked, his glance seeing her looking out to the windswept path leading back to the island proper. “Rey...”

She snapped out of her semi-trance, looking at her master now standing before her, some tension in his inquisitive eyes but leaving him as she looked back. “Yes... I’m sorry, Master Skywalker.”

Luke calmed very quickly, reflecting back to the ripples still moving through the wading pool. Rey’s attention was quickly snapped up by the water also, and the black and white shapes within there. “I sense conflict within you, Rey,” Luke told her, reading her as easily as an opened book. “It’s unwise to dwell on thoughts of Kylo Ren, no matter where he is or what he’s doing Rey. You’ve made better progress than I could have imagined... The Force is strong with you, Rey.”

“Thank you, master... You know how much that means to me,” she took a pause, still seeing some vacancy in his expression. “But why do I get the sense you’re going to patronise me?”

“You still need to learn patience, Rey... Calm your mind; do not act out of impatience. It was a lesson I learned myself, the hardest way possible,” he told her gravely, twisting the sleeve of his wrist with his organic fingers, still consulting the pool. Could he sense the same uneasiness as Rey could?

“And what about the Resistance? What if Ren find them? Won’t you consider doing something?”

“How many times have you asked me?”

He did not want to hear this again – Luke continued feeling his robotic prosthetic as he moved passed his apprentice to the cove pathway that led around the side of the mountain and back to the island. Rey moved with him, flanking him. “As many times as I have to keep asking you every time it comes up in conversation master. You’ve dodged my question about it for two years.”

“Because my only concern right now is training you to a point where you can go back to them, Rey. The Resistance doesn’t need or want me, I promise you.

“And we both know that isn’t the case, Master Skywalker. What about Leia? What about your sister?”

Luke stopped, sensing Leia the moment Rey brought her up. There were things his apprentice did not know of the general, had never asked and he had never told her. Leia was safer without him, along with the rest of the Resistance and the rest of the galaxy.

“There’s still much you have to learn young one,” Skywalker told her, one final word on the topic. “If you decide for yourself that you want to learn it... You have to do what you feel is right, of course.”

Rey nodded, feeling like she once again had gotten nowhere with him. And yet on the cusp of his words, she felt as if she had learned something by ways of insight into her stoic and reserved master. As he left she returned to the overhang of the mountain’s cliff edge and took up her meditative posture once more as he had taught her. She surrounded herself with stones, raising them up with some effort and the Force surrounding her – deep within meditation Rey sensed she would find some more wisdom as to what to do about Ren encroaching on her thoughts much more suddenly. Perhaps she would find some semblance of hope and peace about her friends in the Resistance. Quickly, she thought of Finn, the scars deep into his back and spinal column but his life more lived than ever. Even sensing Ren’s looming shadow in parts unknown, Finn’s presence in her mind was much stronger than the fledgeling Sith. The lightsaber of Anakin Skywalker came floating out from her pocket and levitated stationary in front of her face behind the veil of stones forming a ring around her. Unlike her mentor, she could not levitate herself yet but was getting there, surely.

“I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me. I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me. I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me.”

She kept on saying it far into the moving of the hour, with the lightsaber slowly coming apart and rebuilding itself before her closed eyes.


End file.
